Skip to main content
Tag

Cecil County

Christmas Poem McKinsey 1919 Featured Photo SIZED
Delmarva Storytelling Comes to North East, Md. on Tue., March 3 The Newsroom

Delmarva Storytelling Comes to North East, Md. on Tue., March 3

Author and storyteller Jim Duffy of Secrets of the Eastern Shore will spin fun and fascinating true-life “Delmarva Tales” on Tue., March 3, 2026 at the Cecil County library branch in North East, Md. The show starts at 6:30pm. Jim Duffy The talk will include stories from Duffy’s new book, Ordinary Heroes of Old Delmarva: Inspiring True Tales of Courage, Kindness, and Community. Duffy will…
December 31, 2025
Christmas Poem McKinsey 1919 Featured Photo SIZED
A Poetic Christmas Interlude, 1919 Quote of the DayWay Back Machine

A Poetic Christmas Interlude, 1919

The poet Folger McKinsey was born in Elkton, Md. in 1866 and got his start as a journalist and writer in the Eastern's Shore's Cecil County. Later, he became a newspaperman for the Baltimore Sun. There, he eventually became "staff poet"--yup, the Sun did have have such a position. At Christmastime in 1919, McKinsey published a poem titled “The Hills of Pine.” Most of it…
December 1, 2025
Sunset atBlackwater 2013 Featured Image
From the Books: Charlestown’s Innocent Stream with a Deadly Name From the BooksWay Back Machine

From the Books: Charlestown’s Innocent Stream with a Deadly Name

In the book You Wouldn't Believe! storyteller Jim Duffy serves up 44 Strange and Wondrous Delmarva Tales that run the gamut from true crime to romance and adventure and comedy. Every story is true. Every chapter is a story unto itself, perfect for relaxed flipping and browsing. Here is one of the true-crime chapters: The last time I was in Charlestown, on Maryland’s Upper Eastern…
November 17, 2025
Sunset atBlackwater 2013 Featured Image
Jim Duffy’s Delmarva Storytelling Show is in Elkton, Md. on Thursday, May 9 The Newsroom

Jim Duffy’s Delmarva Storytelling Show is in Elkton, Md. on Thursday, May 9

Storyteller Jim Duffy of Secrets of the Eastern Shore will share fun and fascinating "Tales of Delmarva" days gone by in a talk sponsored by the Cecil County Library at 6:30pm on Thu., May 9, 2024 at the library's Elkton branch. Duffy is an award-winning writer and author of five books that explore travel, history and culture themes on the Eastern Shore and in Delaware.…
March 12, 2024
BULLET-POINT BIOGRAPHY: The Horse Lover of Elkton, Maryland Way Back Machine

BULLET-POINT BIOGRAPHY: The Horse Lover of Elkton, Maryland

I was looking up something else in the Nov. 6, 1934 edition of the Cecil Whig newspaper when I stumbled into Isaac Solomon. My attention wandered across the page and landed on this headline: Negro, Who Went Hungry to Feed Racehorses, Dies. Here are a few tidbits from that story: • The death of Isaac Solomon, Negro racehorse fancier, was something like the passing of…
April 8, 2022
Quickie Weddings in Elkton, Maryland
When Elkton Was the Quickie-Wedding Capitol of the Country From the BooksWay Back Machine

When Elkton Was the Quickie-Wedding Capitol of the Country

This is an excerpt from my book, Eastern Shore Road Trips #2: 26 MORE One-Day Adventures on Delmarva. It's a fun "Way Back Machine" postscript to a chapter that wanders through Elkton and North East, Md., as well as down to Elk Neck State Park and the Turkey Point Lighthouse. More info on the book here. In 1913, the state of Delaware adopted a new…
January 28, 2022
Turkey Point Light Fannie Salter Featured Photo
Distaff Beauty: The Women Lighthouse Keepers of Turkey Point CharactersDestinationsWay Back Machine

Distaff Beauty: The Women Lighthouse Keepers of Turkey Point

This is a free excerpt from Eastern Shore Road Trips 2: 26 MORE One-Day Adventures on Delmarva. It comes from a chapter that includes stops in the towns of Elkton, North East, and Charlestown, as well as a visit to a covered bridge the remains of an old gristmill. The most beautiful of those overlooks lies at the end of a 12-or-so-mile drive down Turkey…
December 31, 2020
First Steamboat on the Chesapeake Featured Image
How Capt. Edward Trippe Brought the Steamboat Revolution to the Chesapeake CharactersWay Back Machine

How Capt. Edward Trippe Brought the Steamboat Revolution to the Chesapeake

In tumultuous times, we sometimes miss the forest for the trees. Wartime news ruled the day during the summer of 1813. Nearly 40 British ships prowled the Chesapeake Bay. The bad guys burned a pair of Maryland towns, Fredericktown and Georgetown, and attacked another, St. Michaels. A vessel named Chesapeake dominated newspaper headlines that June--she was a U.S. Navy frigate captured by the bad guys…
June 28, 2020
Colonial Tax Day on Delmarva Hunters Featured Image
QUOTE OF THE DAY: In Colonial Times, You Could Pay Your Tax Bill in Squirrels’ Heads Quote of the DayWay Back Machine

QUOTE OF THE DAY: In Colonial Times, You Could Pay Your Tax Bill in Squirrels’ Heads

Taxes come due a little later than usual here in 2020. Because of the big pandemic, the government pushed the deadline back to July 15. My condolences to those of you still wading through paperwork. If it's any consolation, taxes were complicated back in colonial times, too--just in a different way, one that might have you donning camo garb and grabbing a gun instead of…
June 24, 2020
Ode to Steamboats Featured Image
ODE TO THE STEAMBOATS: ‘When the Bay Boats Blow’ Quote of the DayWay Back Machine

ODE TO THE STEAMBOATS: ‘When the Bay Boats Blow’

This ode to the steamboat era was written in 1910 by Folger McKinzey (1866-1950), who grew up on the Eastern Shore in Elkton, Md. and became something of an adolescent prodigy. He became editor of the weekly Shore Gazette newspaper in Ocean Grove, N.J. at age 17 and then, at 20, returned to Elkton as assistant editor of the Cecil Whig. While there, he brought Walt…
April 1, 2020